Instead of closing two Highway 91 ramps in Riverside’s Magnolia Center Monday night, Feb. 24, Caltrans workers will get rolling a day earlier, putting the neighborhood south of downtown Riverside on alert for a Monday-morning traffic crunch.

The work will start earlier because – wait for it – “it looks they are ahead, and wanted to get started sooner,” Caltrans spokeswoman Michelle Profant said Friday of the planned 10-day shutdown.

The Sunday, Feb. 23 shutdown of the eastbound Central Avenue on-ramp at 10 p.m. and the westbound Arlington Avenue on-ramp at 9 p.m. was originally scheduled for Monday night. The closures 24 hours earlier means commuters who use those on-ramps will need to figure out alternate routes for Monday morning.

The ramps should re-open the night of March 5. Work can be affected by weather.

It’s part of the $232 million Highway 91 HOV Project, widening six miles of the freeway between Adams Street and the 60/91/215 interchange north of downtown Riverside. The project, which should be completed this year, will add a diamond lane in each direction.

A journalist since 1975 for City News Service in Los Angeles, The Associated Press in Los Angeles and New York, and The Press-Enterprise, Richard K. De Atley has been Entertainment Editor and a features writer. He has also reported on trials and breaking news. He is currently a business reporter for The P-E. De Atley is a Cal State Long Beach graduate, a lifelong Southern Californian (except for that time in New York -- which was great!) and has been in Riverside since 1992.